Orphaned, and after a harsh beginning to her life, and becoming a doctor, Ella decides to travel west and offer medicine to the New Frontier. She answers an ad from a miner with a daughter who is persistently sick. The miner, sick little girl and Ella find themselves becoming a family. Ella is slowly integrated into the community and finds both challenges and rewards in it. The mining company sends a company doctor out to the town, and he challenges the validity of Ella's medical certificate and her knowledge of medicine. The latter turns out to be genuinely far better than the company doctor.

Although this romance is still for everyone to read, there are a couple of brief and mild intimate episodes as the couple goes further into their lives.